Police: 4 dead after La. shootings, 3 injured

Law enforcement officers investigate on U.S. 90 near Bayou Blue, La., where Ben Freeman committed suicide after going on a shooting rampage Thursday.

LOCKPORT, La. – A nurse embroiled in a custody fight with his ex-wife killed his current wife before shooting his former in-laws and his onetime boss in a rampage that spanned two parishes in Louisiana, leaving three people dead and three wounded. He then fatally shot himself in the head, authorities said.

All three survivors remained hospitalized Friday, two in critical condition, Brennan Matherne, a spokesman for the Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office, said in an email. He said deputies are still investigating the motive.

Preliminary evidence shows that Ben Freeman, 38, first killed his wife, Denise Taylor Freeman, before he went on a rampage and shot the others Thursday, Maj. Malcolm Wolfe wrote in an email.

Taylor Freeman’s body was found in a bathtub, and an autopsy conducted Friday showed that she suffocated and drowned, said Terrebonne Parish Sheriff Jerry Larpenter.

Ben Freeman then attacked his former in-laws with a shotgun in Lafourche Parish about 45 miles southwest of New Orleans, wounding parish Councilman Louis Phillip Gouaux and Gouaux’s daughter Andrea, Matherne said. Both were in critical condition after surgery early Friday in New Orleans, Matherne wrote. Gouaux’s wife, Susan, was dead when deputies arrived, he said.

Susan – “Pixie” to her friends – was a teachers’ aide at Holy Savior Elementary School. She also was a talented needlewoman and knitter who designed the state bicentennial quilt square for Lafourche Parish and made scarves for all her friends, Parish President Charlotte Randolph said in a telephone interview.

She said that she went to school at one time or another with both Philip and Susan Gouaux, and that Susan Gouaux taught her grandchildren. The couple has six adult daughters.

Gouaux called 911 around 6:40 p.m. Thursday from his home in Lockport, telling dispatchers he had been shot in the throat, The Courier newspaper in Houma reported. Freeman was divorced from Gouaux’s daughter Jeanne, whom he married in 1997.

Jeanne Gouaux – also a nurse – had filed several protective orders against Freeman, who had pleaded guilty to harassment charges and was allowed only supervised visits with their four children, said Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre. The last protective order expired less than a month ago, he said.

“Clearly, there has been a very difficult and complicated divorce/custody issue going on,” Webre said during a news conference late Thursday.

On Nov. 27, Ben Freeman was issued a citation for simple battery on Denise Freeman, the sheriff’s office said in a news release. A court date had been scheduled for Jan. 16, 2014.

Court records show Freeman agreed in June to pay Jeanne Gouaux $22,560 in overdue child support payments dating back two years. A settlement filed the following month showed the couple would sell three adjacent lots near her parents’ house and split the $25,000 in proceeds; Freeman also agreed to pay Gouaux $39,000.

Jeanne Gouaux and the children lived with her parents for a while after the divorce, said Rita Bonvillain, 83, a neighbor of the family for nearly 30 years. She said Andrea Gouaux, a nurse like her sister Jeanne, was visiting from Texas.

Whenever a holiday came, she said, children filled the house and yard. A trampoline, soccer balls and a swing hanging from a big oak in the front yard testified to that.

Bonvillain choked up and held back tears several times as she talked about the Gouauxes. Since her husband died, they regularly have stopped by to ask if she needs groceries or other errands run. The councilman once told her, “If you ever hear a sound at night and want someone to check it out, call me,” she said.

About 20 minutes after the first shootings, Freeman arrived at the home of Ochsner St. Anne General Hospital CEO Milton Bourgeois in nearby Raceland, about 8 miles from Lockport. Bourgeois was shot and killed at close range; his wife, Ann, was shot in the leg and was listed in stable condition at a hospital, Matherne said.

Bourgeois had been CEO of the hospital in Raceland since 1988, Giselle Hecker, spokeswoman for Ochsner Health Systems, said in an email.

Freeman had worked at the hospital as a registered nurse before he was fired in 2011, Webre said. Webre could not say why Freeman was fired but said police had been called there previously after Freeman damaged a room. Freeman told officers he would seek mental help, Webre said.

Freeman also had worked at two other hospitals, which along with St. Anne had been placed on lockdown for a time Thursday.

Ben Freeman was found dead around 10:45 p.m. along U.S. Highway 90 near Bayou Blue. He had shot himself in the head.

Officers searching for Freeman found the body of his current wife, Denise Taylor Freeman, in the bathroom of their house, Terrebonne Parish Sheriff Jerry Larpenter told The Courier. Her cause of death hasn’t been determined, but Freeman is suspected of killing her as well.

At the home, a man who did not give his name demanded that an Associated Press reporter leave his sister’s property.

Others in the neighborhood of quaint middle-class, ranch-style houses in Houma, the Terrebonne Parish seat, said the house was originally hers.

She had only recently married Freeman, but she and her son Josh – of elementary school age – had lived there for years, said Glenn Cradeur, who has owned his house, two down from hers, for 28 years. He said he believed the boy was not home when his mother was killed.

Cradeur said he saw no signs of trouble until about two weeks ago, when he saw police vehicles outside the home, responding to what he believed was a domestic dispute.

He returned from a visit to out-of-town relatives to find emergency vehicles outside the house and stunned neighbors gathered nearby.